TL;DR 640x480
This should be illegal. We had webcams like this 20 years ago. But Nintendo customers seem to enjoy outdated hardware. It's a tradition at this point
this post was submitted on 27 Jun 2025
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I just read that this camera is used to animate avatars. I'm sure they won't be using tons of processing power to read facial expressions.
Are there going to be any games that actually make use of the camera as a camera?
If so, I just imagine people sending their dicks or memes over the camera.
It's a crappy 3rd party accessory. Haven't all consoles suffered similar?
Hori are well-known for their high quality controllers of all kinds. It's pretty sad that they put out a piece of garbage like this.
I mean, it kinda makes sense as a webcam for only being used with the Switch 2... from a 'minimum viable product' standpoint.
4 picture in picture windows of 640 x 480 on a 1920 x 1080 screen?
Eh, good enough, rofl.
I mean yeah, this is a joke, I also had a 640 x 480 webcam 20 years ago... but its very clear Nintendo has pivoted to the 'milk all the accumulated goodwill out of our customer base' phase of grand corporate strategy.
They've gone full Mr. Krabs.
but they also sell an official, better quality one, 1080p, without the flower
matt gray made a camera cover for it
It's not an official Nintendo product.
But they sold the permission to have this garbage made with their character and branding.
To Hori, a company that makes fairly decent third-party controllers. They likely had a reasonable expectation that the product wouldn't be shit.
It disgusts me to defend Nintendo in anything but this just isn't their fault.
Companies usually get a test product before approval. That's because you wouldn't want to license to some who might go rogue for some cash and do a Nindildo or such.
On the bright side, the camera/Switch doesn't use a proprietary connector, so you can plug a lot of cameras into the thing, and it will generally work.
It's not like the DS days, where if you wanted to plug a microphone in in addition to your headphones, they had a special connector for the mic part.
640 by 480 is fine if you have a good enough sensor and lens, like broadcast NTSC video
Ok, I'll bite.
Why does a game console need a webcam?
To allow for a live avatar. For example when playing Mario Kart online you can see the reactions of your friends your playing with. When you hit someone with a red shell and they make a mad face, you get to see it.
Microphones have been in gaming for a while, this is just the next step.
Now... Is any of that necessary? No, not really. Is it kinda neat? Maybe for some.
It sucks because it’s cute. I like piranha plants in general. Honestly though I don’t expect more from Hori. When I saw it was there’s and not Nintendo propers I was instantly hesitant. I just wanted a cute webcam for my work office.
Surprised you can even get such shit sensors anymore. Surely it's cheaper to get the mass produced HD+ ones nowadays? Or did someone find a warehouse of 90s trash?
They could have gotten a good deal on binned HD+ ones where they just were able to lower the resolution instead. Wouldn’t really know unless you open one up and look at the parts.
Nintendo takes pride in using outdated hardware. Kinda cool in some cases kinda "wtf" in others.
This camera is a Hori product though.
Nintendo missed an opportunity to make a good, cute one.
Not that I would ever want to be filmed while gaming. If I did, I'd at least try to make a few bucks by streaming.
I like muted looks since it goes into a living room. Bought XSX over PS5 for this reason (among others).
As to usefulness, it’s a toy. Making faces while overtaking someone in Mario Kart for all to see is pretty funny.
If you don't want to see others making faces, can you disable this?
If you don’t want to see their faces you have to stay in the lead.
lol, I can't make up my mind if it will be fun or annoying to play Mario Kart with you.
Absolutely no reason to buy it unless you love the design. Third party webcams will work with the switch 2.
Yeah, I wanted this when it was originally announced but recall reading after that the specs aren't so good. We finally have the confirmation / review now.
Charging premium while delivering worse than Ali-express
I just don't think the software is going to be good enough to get me to fork over for this console and peripherals this time. I grew up a Nintendo kid, but I'll most likely be sitting this generation out. They want way too much for way too little.
I got the light version of this as a joke birthday present. It plugs into a USB slot and makes an anemic light source. Haven't used it much in summer but it might have some limited utility in winter.
Those camera modules for laptops are worth almost nothing with modern resolutions. How greedy can Nintendo be if they cut costs this way???
At least they didn't make it proprietary so you could use one of these modules instead if you solder a USB cable to it, for like 5$
This is a Hori product, official Nintendo camera is much better (but also kinda overpriced).
Oh, I missed that. That's actually a bit surprising since Hori usually makes very high quality stuff.
back in the day they did but not really any more